Want to know more?

If you want to know what your own data is telling you, we’d love to show you. Platfora enables business users to visually interact with all of their data — at petabyte-scale — in seconds, allowing them to find new opportunities and manage risk.

We’ve been told our technology is impressive.

Leadership

Ben Werther

Founder & CEO

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Ben Werther

Founder & CEO

Platfora

Ben has a vision for big data, and he’s bringing it to life at Platfora.

Ben Werther launched Platfora to transform the way businesses use big data analytics. Under Ben’s leadership, Platfora is now one of the hottest companies in Silicon Valley and a leader in the big data analytics space. Before founding Platfora, Ben was vice president of products for DataStax, where he shaped the company’s enterprise and Hadoop strategy, and was also head of product at big data analytics company Greenplum. Ben has a B.S. in Computer Science from Monash University and an M.S. in Computer Science from Stanford.

Peter Schlampp

Vice President of Product

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Peter Schlampp

Vice President of Product

An early member of the Platfora team, Peter leads the charge to put big data in users’ hands in a beautiful and easy way.

Peter Schlampp remembers playing with the keys of a TRS-80 when he was seven years old — and since then, he’s been destined to build category-defining products that make businesses faster, safer, smarter, and more profitable. Before coming to Platfora, Peter was vice president of marketing and product management at Solera, where he built the first DVR for network traffic. At IronPort, where Peter was senior director of product management, he defined the world’s first email security appliance, making the world safe from spam and viruses. He then became director and general manager of the Cisco/IronPort Development Center in Bangalore, India. Peter has a B.S. in Biology from Boston College.

John Schuster

Vice President of Engineering

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John Schuster

Vice President of Engineering

John’s special skill is his intense focus on people and culture, which he uses to build incredibly strong teams that build big data’s most innovative products.

John Schuster has built many successful enterprise products spanning technologies, including analytics, distributed applications and servers, data and application integration, cloud/SaaS/hosted infrastructure, storage, networking, and security. Before coming to Platfora, John held leadership positions at snapLogic, Cisco, IronPort, and NetApp. He spent his first years as an engineer building early web technology at Internet Middleware Corporation and JPL. John has a B.S. in Mathematics from Occidental College.

Robert DeMartino

Vice President of Sales

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Robert DeMartino

Vice President of Sales

Bob has a long track record of energizing sales teams and bringing transformational technologies to market.

Robert DeMartino manages Platfora’s direct sales operations and builds strategic partnerships with big data SIs and Hadoop distribution vendors, including Cloudera, HortonWorks, MapR, and Pivotal. Before coming to Platfora, Bobby led strategic sales and business development efforts at Greenplum and Virident Systems. He also spent 15 years at Sun Microsystems in various executive leadership roles – he was responsible for a $500 million revenue unit and served on the company’s sales leadership council. Bobby has a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Pittsburgh.

Viviana Faga

Vice President of Marketing

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Viviana Faga

Vice President of Marketing

Viviana’s passion for positioning, product strategy, and social media marketing is building awareness of the Platfora brand in every market.

Viviana Faga has more than 15 years of experience in marketing, product, sales and strategy for successful enterprise brands, and is responsible for developing and executing Platfora’s outbound marketing and communications strategy. Before coming to Platfora, she was vice president of marketing at Yammer, and has also held product marketing and leadership positions at salesforce.com, Jive Software, and Accenture. Viviana holds a B.S. in Operations Management Information Systems from Santa Clara University.

Mike Asher

Chief Financial Officer

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Mike Asher

Chief Financial Officer

Mike is an entrepreneurial CFO with a strong track record of building successful, innovative technology companies.

With an engineering background, Mike Asher has always had a love and appreciation for technology. He began his finance career at Cisco, and then as an executive at a series of Silicon Valley start-up companies focusing on finance, strategy, and operations. Prior to Platfora, Mike was VP Finance at Octane Software (acquired by Epiphany), CFO at newScale (acquired by Cisco), CFO at Greenplum (acquired by EMC), and CFO at Appcelerator.

John Eshleman

Founding Vice President of Technology

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John Eshleman

Founding Vice President of Technology

Simple and easy to use — That’s John’s vision for the future of big data platforms, and as a technologist, he’s helping to pioneer that new frontier at Platfora.

John Eshleman was the first engineer at Greenplum, where he built the core of the company’s parallel database engine and led the company’s engineering initiatives. Other previous roles include principal engineer at Sociable Labs, and senior developer at Metapa and Didera. As an integration manager for HPTi, where he began his career, John built many of the world’s first Linux supercomputing clusters. John has a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Maryland.

Kevin Beyer

Chief Technology Officer

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Kevin Beyer

Chief Technology Officer

Kevin is a significant technical contributor to today’s big data infrastructure, and at Platfora, he’s all about improving the speed and usability of Hadoop for everyday businesspeople.

For more than two decades, Kevin Beyer has been devoted to improving the performance and scalability of mission-critical data systems for enterprises. On top of building database systems and Hadoop technologies, he’s published more than 30 technical papers and frequently serves as an industry speaker. Kevin is the creator of Jaql, a scripting language for large-scale, semi-structured data processing on Hadoop that he developed as a research staff member at IBM. He also added XML indexing, materialized view, and replication support to the IBM DB2. Kevin holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Wisconsin, Madison. The subject of his dissertation was analytical query processing.

Shea Kelly

VP of People Operations

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Shea Kelly

VP of People Operations

Big data innovation requires big thinking, and Shea is laser-focused on helping Platfora attract the best big data talent and maintaining a culture where they can thrive.

Shea Kelly leads all things people-related at Platfora, and is an integral business partner with the executive team. She has 20 years of experience in global strategic human resources, and has built a reputation for targeting and growing deeply admired leaders who are uniquely geared to fulfill the aspirations of the businesses they guide. Before joining Platfora, Shea was senior vice president of human resources at Wize Commerce Inc. Her long career track in human resources includes executive roles at Juniper Networks Inc., Hewlett Packard Co., Actelion Pharmaceuticals, Citicorp, and the General Electric Company. Shea has an M.S. in Organizational Psychology from Purdue University, and earned her B.S. in Psychology from the University of Connecticut.

Board of Directors

Ben Werther

Founder & CEO

Platfora

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Ben Werther

Founder & CEO

Platfora

Ben has a vision for big data, and he’s bringing it to life at Platfora.

Ben Werther launched Platfora to transform the way businesses use big data analytics. Under Ben’s leadership, Platfora is now one of the hottest companies in Silicon Valley and a leader in the big data analytics space. Before founding Platfora, Ben was vice president of products for DataStax, where he shaped the company’s enterprise and Hadoop strategy, and was also head of product at big data analytics company Greenplum. Ben has a B.S. in Computer Science from Monash University and an M.S. in Computer Science from Stanford.

Roger Lee

General Partner

Battery Ventures

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Roger Lee

General Partner

Battery Ventures

Battery invests in cutting-edge, category-defining businesses in markets including software and services, Web infrastructure, e-commerce, digital media and industrial technologies. Founded in 1983, the firm backs companies at stages ranging from seed to buyout and invests globally from offices in Boston, Silicon Valley and Israel. To learn more, visit www.battery.com and follow the firm on Twitter @BatteryVentures.

Steve Walske

Managing Director

Myriad Investments

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Steve Walske

Managing Director

Myriad Investments

Steve Walske led Parametric Technology Corporation as the CEO from 1986 to 2000. Under his guidance, Parametric—a supplier of mechanical design and manufacturing software — established itself as one of the largest software-only companies in the world with revenues in excess of $1 billion. He guided the company from its start-up phase through its initial public offering in December 1989 to its position as market leader in mechanical design automation software. Since 2000, he has worked with a number of private software companies in his capacity as Managing Director of Myriad Investments, LLC. He holds an undergraduate degree from Princeton University and an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School.

Mike Speiser

Managing Director

Sutter Hill Ventures

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Mike Speiser

Managing Director

Sutter Hill Ventures

Sutter Hill Ventures has financed technology-based start-ups and assisted entrepreneurs since 1962. We have developed strong industry networks, considerable operating and venture capital experience, and an understanding of the challenges early-stage and high-growth companies face. Once we invest in a company, we bring to bear our time, expertise, and extensive networks to help these companies succeed.

Scott Weiss

General Partner

Andreessen Horowitz

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Scott Weiss

General Partner

Andreessen Horowitz

Founded by Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz, Andreessen Horowitz provides seed, venture, and growth-stage funding to the best new technology companies. Our general partners are recognized experts in the creation, scaling, and operation of high-growth technology companies. We have investments in over 90 companies, including Box, Fab, Facebook, Foursquare, Groupon, Jawbone, Pinterest, Twitter, and Zynga.

Brian Paul

Managing Director

Tenaya Capital

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Brian Paul

Managing Director

Tenaya Capital

Brian is a Managing Director and founding partner at Tenaya Capital, an investor in high-growth technology companies in the enterprise software, consumer internet, IT infrastructure, communications, and electronics sectors. We partner with exceptional entrepreneurs that are addressing growing markets with proprietary, market-leading technology. Our goal is to build long-term partnerships with our entrepreneurs to attract great talent, enhance operations, and maximize value.

Investors

Andreessen Horowitz

Andreessen Horowitz backs bold entrepreneurs who move fast, think big, and are committed to building the next major franchises in technology. Founded… more

Andreessen Horowitz

Andreessen Horowitz backs bold entrepreneurs who move fast, think big, and are committed to building the next major franchises in technology. Founded by Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz, we provide entrepreneurs with access to our deep expertise and insights in innovation, business development, market intelligence, executive and technical talent, and marketing and brand building.

Sutter Hill Ventures

Sutter Hill Ventures is a venture capital firm that finances technology-based start-up and early-stage companies that pioneer products or services in… more

Sutter Hill Ventures

Sutter Hill Ventures is a venture capital firm that finances technology-based start-up and early-stage companies that pioneer products or services in growth markets, especially those in information technology and health care. Founded in 1962, it is one of Silicon Valley’s original venture capital firms. Some of the companies backed by Sutter Hill include: Network Appliance, Legato, Quantum, StorageTek, Data Domain, Alteon, Linear Technology, nVidia, and BroadVision.

Battery Ventures

Battery Ventures

Battery invests in cutting-edge, category-defining businesses in markets including software and services, web infrastructure, e-commerce, digital media, and industrial technologies. Founded in 1983, the firm backs companies at stages ranging from seed to buyout and invests globally from offices in Boston, Silicon Valley, and Israel.

Tenaya Capital

Tenaya Capital

Tenaya Capital invests in high-growth technology companies in the enterprise software, consumer internet, IT infrastructure, communications, and electronics sectors. Our firm is managed by a cohesive group of partners who have worked together for more than a decade. We partner with exceptional entrepreneurs who are addressing growing markets with proprietary, market-leading technology. Tenaya has offices in Portola Valley, California, and Wellesley, Massachusetts.

In-Q-Tel

In-Q-Tel is the not-for-profit, strategic investment firm that works to identify, adapt, and deliver innovative technology solutions to support the… more

In-Q-Tel

In-Q-Tel is the not-for-profit, strategic investment firm that works to identify, adapt, and deliver innovative technology solutions to support the missions of the U.S. Intelligence Community. Launched in 1999 as a private, independent organization, IQT’s mission is to identify and partner with companies developing cutting-edge technologies that serve the national security interests of the United States.

Citi Ventures

Citi Ventures

Citi Ventures is Citi’s global corporate venturing arm, chartered to collaborate with internal and external partners to conceive, partner, launch, and scale new ventures that have the potential to disrupt and transform the financial services industry, drive client success, and generate new value for Citi.

Cisco Investments

Cisco Investments has more than 40 investment professionals with deep market and technology expertise located in major geographies, including U.S… more

Cisco Investments

Cisco Investments has more than 40 investment professionals with deep market and technology expertise located in major geographies, including U.S., Canada, China, India, Israel, and Europe. Over the last 20 years, we have invested in hundreds of companies and helped them to successful IPOs or acquisitions. We currently have a portfolio of $2B with more than 80 direct investments, and hold Limited Partner positions in more than 35 funds globally.

Want to know more?

If you want to know what your own data is telling you, we’d love to show you. Platfora enables business users to visually interact with all of their data — at petabyte-scale — in seconds, allowing them to find new opportunities and manage risk.